It might be slightly redundant to say that superhero movies have entered their baroque phase. After all, unbridled spectacle, melodrama, and ornate design elements are inherent to the genre. Still, the 2016 slate of comic book epics felt even more exaggerated than usual. There are more of these movies than ever, with budget-bulging cataclysmic finales all gunning to top each other. The superhero films (and spin-off TV series) that succeeded most emphatically are the ones that went just a notch smaller, to satisfying effect.

This spring’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, a film reviled by critics, opens with the destruction of most of downtown Metropolis within the first 10 minutes. That this is a callback to the end of the previous film in the DC Comics continuity, Man of Steel, is beside the point. It shows that perverse 9/11 imagery featuring Kryptonian eye lasers definitely melting steel beams is so omnipresent in these movies that they aren’t even special enough to save for the third act. X-Men: Apocalypse might feature the most boring extinction-level event in cinema history, and that’s including Justin Guarini’s acting in From Justin to Kelly.

From Suicide Squad to Batman v Superman, why are DC’s films so bad?

Read more

Dawn of Justice was a worldwide blockbuster, in no small part due to the novelty of seeing the biggest names in the genre duking it out for the first time ever in big-budget live action. Apocalypse took in 27% less at the global box office than its predecessor, X-Men: Days of Future Past. Of course, Days of Future Past had the benefit of a novelty of its own: the first commingling of the original X-Men cast of Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, and the rest with Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence and the First Class prequel cast. Sometimes, pop cultural happenings and casting gimmicks can wipe the stench of familiarity away from even the most stale premises.

That’s what the Marvel Cinematic Universe has in spades. The genius of its game plan is that it bakes novelty into every single release through the crossovers between franchises – Thor popping up in Doctor Strange, the first sighting of Spider-Man in the official Marvel universe, etc – so that even the third Captain America solo movie seems like a big deal when it happens. Captain America: Civil War is arguably the greatest triumph of 2016 in the superhero genre despite having to juggle a huge cast and a plot that involves flashbacks, espionage, personal betrayal, family secrets, global terrorism and political machinations. It accomplishes this nifty trick by paring down the spectacle to its most essential elements.

Civil War might feature the biggest conclave of comic book characters ever committed to screen – a fistfight on an airport tarmac between opposing hero groups – but its true finale is a one-on-one brawl with stakes that are purely personal. A generous reading of the film would say that it is very relevant to our times because it’s a meditation on how political ideology can often mask more internal prejudices, but I’m not feeling that generous. It’s just a really satisfying comic book story and no, it has nothing to do with Donald Trump. Sorry.

The room it gives the audience to project meaning on to it is a side effect of this smaller story. That there’s no cosmic entity to contend with nor any laborious sci-fi exposition means that the film-makers (directors Anthony and Joe Russo, and screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely) can drill down to easy-to-understand character motivation and feather-light allegory. The idle mind can chew on thematic material much more easily when there isn’t the mythological knot of Apocalypse to untie or the laborious foreshadowing of Dawn of Justice to distract from the actual movie projecting in front of you. Granted, Civil War has plenty of allusions, callbacks, flashbacks and narrative bricklaying, but it accomplishes it with a semblance of elegance that renders it close to seamless.

There was nothing elegant about Deadpool, the R-rated Ryan Reynolds X-Men spin-off that dominated the box office in February and March. It was both a send-up of the genre and a competent example of its classic tropes, which was only possible thanks to Reynolds being simultaneously a traditionally handsome movie star and a gifted comic actor. Like Civil War, Deadpool was comparatively modest when stacked next to the carnage depicted in Man of Steel or the Avengers movies. Again, novelty won out. Audiences had yet to see a superhero film that broke the fourth wall so blatantly, that called out the conventions of the formula, and cheerfully laughed at itself. Deadpool was perfectly timed for a moment when viewers might be settling into the idea that maybe it’s all been done. That it came from 20th Century Fox, the same studio that has settled into a comfortable rut with its lethargic X-Men series, should feel like a miracle.

Spider-Man: Homecoming trailer – eight things we learned

Read more

As the studio develops the inevitable Deadpool sequel, the central question is: do you embrace the baroque and hope that Deadpool 2 can compete with DC and Marvel in the spectacle department, or do you retain the smaller scale that made the original such a refreshing piece of work for so many fans? That conundrum led to the exit of Deadpool director Tim Miller, who favored bigger and better, in favor of John Wick director David Leitch – a helmer with experience getting more out of less.

The reality is that Deadpool 2 will still be a huge financial success and late summer’s Suicide Squad proved that DC’s bloated, ugly vision of comic book films is too big too fail. If audiences refuse to outright reject Superman breaking someone’s neck in a public place and everything Jared Leto did as the Joker, they’ll be glad to see Wonder Woman and Justice League more than once. The X-Men franchise didn’t truly run out of gas (and Hugh Jackman appearances) for 16 years. For half of my life, there’s been a steady stream of X-Men films – some good, some horrendous – and only now does it appear that they’ve got a true dearth of ideas about how to move forward.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is healthier than ever before. Doctor Strange added mysticism and the occult to the storyline, further recharging the novelty of the series. Marvel’s Netflix shows – Daredevil, Luke Cage, Jessica Jones and the forthcoming Iron Fist – have enough critical and cultural cache that they’ve washed the bad taste of ABC’s Agents of SHIELD from our collective mouth. Those shows, like Civil War on the big screen, value character and theme above all else. Marvel’s many distant competitors have to learn the lesson that if we don’t care about the characters getting smashed by the collapsing building or zapped by the giant laser beam, then there’s no reason to come back for part two. Or part three. Or part 12.